Miami, Florida-based Aeronautical Engineers (AEI) received the world’s first supplemental type certificate (STC) from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration for the MD-80SF passenger-to-freighter conversion, the company announced last week. (www.ainonline.com) More...

We had one at the DFW ramp that got the conversion done from time to time. There was not a lot of interest from the vacation charter market, UPS's target demographic for this "experiment." The little UPS Airline came and went without much fanfare in either direction.

I'm kidding in one sense but we rode like that in the military and I'll bet people would sign up if the fares were cheap enough-sort of a bus class. Stack 'em in, give 'em a seat belt in a slide track, and sell tickets. Hell, people ride like that on buses and trains all over the world, some real close by. If the plane crashes your probably gonna die anyway. Lol again.

It's not just worth more, it costs a hellavuh lot more to operate too. Of course, just when compared to the 400 series. The next gen planes are much more cost-effective. If only they didnt break the bank in the process.

It was OK, they still (for me anyways) didnt come up with a valid reason as to why the nose didnt pitch back down when he rolled back right-side-up. One could only presume the absence of power made this possible? Should have gone ahead and landed the thing inverted, as the stabilizer issue would have drilled the plane in as soon as he rolled back upright.

If Tom Clancy had written this, he would have landed inverted. That's why I favor his writings; he takes the time to study up and make sure the ensuing fiction is, at the very least, plausible.

I dont think the average movie-goer knows or cares one way or the other.

At 750K lots of people could write a check for that and never need another damm boarding pass! Few chairs and a sofa, couple of lamps and a card table and the days over. American had great galleys and lots of carts and ovens. Stock up on choice of hot grilled cheese or pimento cheese snacks. No more TSA or sassy seat mates. Long delays or flow control! American has plenty of those MD-80s, take your pick and never buy another ticket! Carry On as much as you want!

Alaska flies "combi's" in the upper one all the time (737)! I use to fly for a company up there in the summer,and see them even convert the 73's either way in about 15-20 minutes. I don't know how everybody got off track talking about movies,Alaska's crash and all? I flew the 3 holer and it was a true "truck",you could even go 10% over MTOW,and it would fly the same!You can pick one up for 1Mil.but have fun with the up-keep!!

"It's a pickup truck with wings." - And a jackscrew that likes to misbehave if you dont check it every month, causing control problems that only Denzel Washington can overcome... as long as he has time to fire up a joint, run through a couple of rails of coke and chase it all down with a Screwdriver beforehand.

Yeah, I think everyone knows a lot more than the general public should about that aircraft. Of course, it took the Alaska Airlines crash to point it out to the whole world... Always does I guess.

I wouldn't chalk that crash to faulty maintenance. The issue wasnt well-known enough to warrant anything beyond standard procedure. Sure, AAL and DAL are all over it now, but not until the issue was discovered.

Same thing with the tail snapping off of Airbus products... Over-controlling a rudder, while traversing a wide-body's wake turbulence... Next thing you know, planes are being grounded and cracks are being discovered. Not faulty mainenance at the time. Now that the operators are aware of the potential, it is now part of the routine checks.

Now that we know about these things, future occurences will be chalked up to faulty maintenance. That's why you have one runaway trim incident and one tail snapping incident.

The movie reference was a joke. Remember the real incident? They really did put that through the sim sessions and NO ONE landed the airplane. This movie allowed ONE person to pull it off.... on weed, coke and booze. I find that funny.

Check out conclusion #22, #45 on the NTSB report. Heck, Wiki even. Alaska's maintenance procedures were faulty. They did the job that suppose to take 4 hours in under 60 minutes and created their own devices to check the jackscrew that proved to not function. If they had followed manufacturer lubrication schedules and end-play checks (even though they were extended per FAA approval) they would have caught this excessive wear on the jackscrew. Have you seen the pctures? Everyone would agree that the FAA dropped the ball also but so did Alaska. Big time.

My decision was made to save my money and not see the movie was made instantly after seeing the preview. But thanks for the re-enforcement. Lots of people will believe it though, you know, the ones that watch wrestling. Lol